The very imperfect data which exist on this important branch of our subject will not enable one to form any sound opinion on the spread of disease from these juvenile sources. It is, however, reasonable to conclude, from the few facts, and from the very facilities afforded at their age for intercommunication between children, that the spread of disease from direct contamination, and the deterioration of health and constitution from unknown excesses, must be very great.
Obscene Publications.—Of these there are vast numbers, and the extent of juvenile contamination from this source must be very great. The Society for the Suppression of Vice, in London, reports having seized, at different periods, thousands of obscene books, copper-plates, and prints, all of which they caused to be destroyed. Within a period of three years they procured the destruction of
| Blasphemous and impure books | 279 | |
| Obscene publications | 1,162 | |
| Obscene songs (on sheets) | 1,495 | |
| Obscene prints | 10,493 |
and even this was but an item in the calculation.
The police of London take but little interest in this matter. The above-mentioned society is the principal agent in the repression of this infamous species of depravity. There are certain places in London in which the trade still lives and flourishes, notwithstanding the attacks made upon it. Holywell Street, in the Strand, and the vicinity of Leicester Square, are places of disgraceful notoriety in this respect. The secret is, that wherever there is a public demand, no repressive laws will ever prevent trade. The attempt at repression but makes it more profitable.
To the corruption of the youthful mind and the preparatives for prostitution these publications must contribute. It is matter of question what number of prostitutes have become such directly from this cause. The results of visitorial inspection do not show among London prostitutes, any more than elsewhere, a taste for books and prints of an obscene tendency. Their taste in literature is that which would prevail among persons of low intellectual calibre. Startling tales, romances with a plentiful spice of horrors, thrilling love-stories, highly wrought and exaggerated narratives, are their taste. In the practice of prostitution, the use of indecent or prurient prints is chiefly for the adornment of visitors’ rooms in brothels.
Education.—In the relations between education and crime are found no distinctive marks whereby prostitution may be separated from any other development of vice or immorality. It is to be presumed that the same general laws which apply to the unregulated manifestation of the passions apply to those with which prostitution is chiefly implicated.
In the present generation it is generally assumed that crime is the offspring of ignorance, therefore Education! is the cry. Education has become a party watchword in England. The necessity of education, the quality and the quantity, with all the minor propositions that branch off from the main question, are, and have been for years, the subject of the hottest polemics. But recent results, evolved from statistical inquiries, would seem to call up the previous question as to the value of education at all. The present work is not the place in which to discuss the fact, or to point out a remedy, or indicate the deficiencies of a system which can suffer such a question to arise. We give the facts. From the Parliamentary reports of 1846-1848, it appears that the number of educated criminals in England was at that time more than twice, and in Scotland more than three and a half that of the uneducated:
| Years. | England. | Scotland. | ||
| Educated. | Uneducated. | Educated. | Uneducated. | |
| 1846 | 16,963 | 7698 | 3155 | 903 |
| 1847 | 19,307 | 9050 | 3562 | 1048 |
| 1848 | 20,176 | 9671 | 3985 | 911 |
In calculating a percentage on certain criminal returns during the undermentioned years, the results were: